Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 22:24:05 -0700
From: Jonathan Stone <jonathan@DSG.Stanford.EDU>
Message-ID: <199809300524.WAA32755@Smeg.DSG.Stanford.EDU>
One of the _really_ important consensus items that we came to then is
that the install tools should, by default, DTRT for the naive user.
Absolutely, no disagreement with that.
By all means have a menu option that turns on more options (NFS vs
diskless vs diskful, or {/, /usr, /usr/share, ..} prefix-by-prefix,
but dont make the naive user jump through those hoops.
I hope I didn't suggest that - I was intending that the default ought to
just DTRT - which is why I auggested as a default install on everywhere
local (which for many users is everywhere) and nowhere NFS - as for most
naive users, that's optimal, with a simple "yes, do install on the server"
switch for those cases where that is needed - actually viewing the list of
prefixes, let alone editing it, ought require some extra effort, and certainly
not be required.
What I don't believe is that it is possible, now, to construct a list of
different bits of the filesystem tree, and make assumptions about any of
those, or how they might be used. In particular, rules about where packages
are allowed to install files seem doomed to me, the only result from that
can be that packages are split into two (or more), and someone has to make sure
that all always get installed and deleted as a set (and remain consistent).
kre